Unless you live in a cave, you’ve heard of “Wordle.” When this fun, English-language word game (originally from the UK) hit the web, it went viral overnight – and ended up getting sold to the New York Times for an “undisclosed price in the low seven figures.”

Wordle gameplay is simple. You start with no information, and guess a five-letter word – which must be in a list of “acceptable” words (which is bigger than the list of possible answers). Once you guess, your guess is color-coded: black if the letter you guessed is not in the word, yellow if it’s in the word but in the wrong place, and green if it’s in the right place. (If there are multiples of a letter, it will color them how you’d expect. So if the word is EVADE and you guess SPREE, it will color your guess black-black-black-yellow-green. If you guess GLENS, you’ll get black-black-yellow-black-black.) You have six chances to get all five spaces to green.

There have been computer scientists blogging about their attempts to solve it algorithmically. People have determined the best word to start. (It’s “CRANE.”) Elementary-school students have made it a daily ritual.

But the traditional Wordle comes with a lot of limitations. For one, there’s only one “Wordle” per day – and it’s the same for everyone. This means that someone could spoil it for you by telling you the day’s word (and there have been numerous attempts to do so) and then you’re out of luck until tomorrow. For another, it’s only five letter English words handpicked from a list. And you only have six guesses. After this, it will just tell you the answer.

So… what to do if you want to keep Wordling? Here’s a review of more than 75 Wordle variations.

This is Wordle with three to seven letters instead of only five and with a wider word list. The six-guess limit is still in place, but it will generate a new, unique word for each game. Meaning that you can play multiple games in a row and different word lengths, but you can’t share it with your distant friend to see who got the day’s word in fewer guesses.

Diffle

It’s some length up to ten letters. You don’t know. But you have unlimited guesses to figure it out.

Wordle Unlimited

This is classic Wordle with one tweak: it continues to generate new answer words. So you aren’t limited to one per day.

Wheedle

The same as Wordle Unlimited, but with old-fashioned video game graphics and sounds.

This is a variation where you’re playing two Wordle games simultaneously, but your guesses for both have to be the same word. When you get one of the words, you have to keep on guessing for the second. Your clues are applied differently for each answer in two columns.

You get seven guesses to guess both words. There is both a “daily Dordle” and a “free play” option.

Quordle

As you might expect, Quordle is quatre-Wordle, a Wordle variation with four words simultaneously. You get nine guesses to get all four words.

There is both a daily version and a “practice” version.

Octordle

And just when you thought it couldn’t get any crazier… Octordle. “Octo” means eight. And that’s how many words you have to guess in this variation, each of your guesses going to all eight words. Thirteen guesses.

Good luck.

Polydle

If you’d rather pick how many words you want to guess… Pick from one to two thousand, three hundred and fifteen. Obviously, there are display problems if you’re trying to do more than a few. And it gives you a lot of guesses, but after you do about seven, the layout gets all wonky (at least in Firefox).

Crosswordle

Here’s an excellent version where you’re solving a crossword of Wordles. You have six guesses for each word (which can be up to five letters), and once you guess wrongly six times you can’t guess anymore for that “clue” – 2 down, etc.

The only downside is that when you lose, it doesn’t reveal the answer.

Word-Based Variations

The phenomenon of Wordle has taken off to such an extent that there are countless fun variations of it. Here are a few of the better ones:

Pictle

This is a very fun (and hard!) variation where you’re given the answer, yes… but you’re not supposed to use it! Rather, you use the known answer to generate deliberately incorrect guesses that will color the board in a given pattern.

There’s a “Gimme” option if you get stuck.

Reversle

It’s the same as “Pictle,” but without the “gimme” option, and with more random patterns of colors you’re trying to make.

Eldrow

This is just one row of “Pictle,” but harder and with no “Gimme” option. Multiple games are available per day.

Survivle

In this, you’re forced to play “hard mode” (you have to use every clue) but not to guess it for as long as possible. The only downside is that it doesn’t tell you what word you’re avoiding.

Wrdl

It’s Wordle without the vowels. All guesses must be real English words (without vowels) and contain exactly five consonants.

It’s harder than you’d think!

Biblicle

For the Christians.

Jewdle

And for the Jews.

NSFWordle

NSFW = not safe for work. So don’t play this on the office computer!

It’s four letters instead of five. They aren’t called “five-letter words,” after all.

Numberle

It’s not easy, because there are 100,000 possible answers, but this uses a number. One per day.

Quantle

Computer nerds, unite! Quantum computing is here.

Now I don’t know jack about this, so sorry, but according to the game, you’re trying to guess a quantum computing equation in six tries. After each guess, the color of the tiles will change to show how close your guess was to the equation.

Guesses comprise quantum gates operating on one qubit's state. All valid equations must have a ket on each side.

Subwaydle

If you’ve blitzed around the Big Apple… this gives you a start point and an end point, and you have to guess the route using the NYC metro. Some familiarity with New York City obviously required.

DNDle

Guess numbers for each stat, to guess the correct Dungeons and Dragons monster.

Worth a Mention: Absurdle

“Absurdle” was one of the first Wordle clones out there, and it’s worth a mention just because it’s a very different mode of gameplay!

Here’s the thing: the answer in Absurdle will change. In short, if you guess it, it will change to anything else in the list that still matches the clues that it’s given you.

Your goal? Exhaust all possible English words (in the list of possible Wordle answers).

Start with something with a lot of common letters (like “CRANE”) because it will always mark your first guess all gray. So get used to that – but know that you’re really cutting down the list of possible words. Your goal is to get that list down to one – and then to type it in.

Unlimited guesses. Have fun.

Lakini, nikijua lugha zaidi?

The list of Wordle variations in different languages is still open, and we update it every day.

• Wortel - Afrikaans Wordle
• Arwordle - Arabic Wordle
• Kelmaly - Arabic Wordle
• Boludle - Argentinian Wordle
• Malay - Bahasa Malaysian Wordle
• Wordle (BOS) - Bosnian Wordle
• Gerdle - Cornish Wordle
• Wörtchen - German Wordle
• Lexoula - Greek Wordle
• Tugma - Hiligaynon Wordle
• Szózat - Hungarian Wordle
• Parolette - Italian Wordle
• Parolle.it - Italian Wordle
• Tlembung - Japanese Wordle
• 꼬들 - 한국어 - Korean Wordle
• 한글 풀어쓰기 5자 - Korean Wordle
• Latindictionary.io - Latin Wordle
• Vārdulis - Latvian Wordle
• kelma.mt - Maltese Wordle
• Mondle - Mongolian Wordle
• Pashtoodle - Pashto Wordle
• Persian - Persian (Farsi) Wordle
• Pinyin - Pinyin Wordle
• ਪੰਜਾਬੀ - Punjabiu Wordle
• Wordle-RO - Romanian Wordle
• Rudle - Russian Wordle
• Sindhal - Sindhi Wordle
• Word-leh! - Singlish Wordle
• Wordle (Spanish) - Spanish Wordle
• Wordle.cl - Spanish Wordle
• Keclap - Sudanese Wordle
• SGWordle - Swiss German Wordle
• Tàu Tâi-gí (Taigi Wordle) - Taigi Wordle
• சொல்லாடல் Soladle - Tamil Wordle
• ไทย - Thai Wordle
• 字知之明 - Traditional Chinese Wordle
• Ukrainian - Ukrainian Wordle
• Слівце - Ukrainian Wordle
• Urdle - Urdu Wordle
• Wordlar - Uzbek Wordle

It’s Social Learning!

The best thing about these games is that you can use the bulk of them (the ones that have a “daily” option) to share your answers, and how many guesses it took you to get there. This way, both you and all your friends can have fun learning – or expressing your inner maple leaves – together.

And, while it may not be the best way to learn a new language, playing in different languages you already speak can really help you master them.

Keep your brain sharp, and after you find the New York Times word, try one of these versions.